The Hero's Woman
by baby-kitsune9
Summary: After the incident with the USJ, Nezu decided to bring on some extra help to prevent the school and it's teachers and students from falling prey to villains again. A couple of doctors, and a security officer/teacher. Now if only Toshinori could figure out why he had bothered to hire a 17 yr old girl to be a security officer in the first place. Toshinori/fem Ichigo.
1. Chapter 1

It was a month or so after the USJ incident had occurred- that was when Nezu decided to bring in a few more teachers and even a couple of doctors on as part of the school staff. Which...wasn't an entirely bad move to make all things considered.

But his choices for the new teachers and staff were rather interesting. If a tad bit questionable.

Especially considering that at least one of them was still just a _kid _whom had just only recently graduated from high school. And though each of them had their reservations about a mere adolescent working at their school as a teacher or something, Nezu had impressed them with said kid's grades- _despite_ the horrible attendance record.

And though each of them knew that they had very valid reasons for not wanting specific people to work in their school...Nezu refused to back down. And even went so far as to set up a teacher's meeting with the newest members of the school staff.

To say that only Hizashi seemed particularly interested in this...farce of a meeting would be an _understatement_. But despite their reservations about the matter, they each decided to give the newbies a shot. Figuring that it couldn't really hurt anything to do so.

Nezu was beyond pleased and left to make the arrangements and returned a shot time later to tell them all that everything was all set.

Everyone would meet later that evening at a restaurant several blocks over from the school, where they would all sit down together over drinks and good food and get to know one another.

* * *

Toshinori was seriously considering the idea of baling, and going straight home, by the time to leave to go meet the newbies actually rolled around. He couldn't help it.

He'd had a long day of alternating between crime fighting, capturing villain's, and...wrangling pesky teenager with both far too much spunk _and_ time on their hands.

It'd been a rough day for him today between his usual crap and now this new stuff that he already didn't _like_. Now don't get him wrong, he knew that logically speaking- new teachers and doctors on the school staff was a logical move.

New teachers meant more people to keep an eye on the kids during times of crisis. And having actual doctors employed as staff members wasn't a bad idea either.

Especially considering that one of them was a _trauma_ doctor who dealt with the worst of things. And even he could understand the merits of having one employed by the school.

The teachers and kids _did_ tend to get messed up pretty often. Medically speaking, that is.

So having a pair of extra hands to help treat their injuries was a good call. There was nothing that he could do or say to dispute that.

But he didn't particularly like the idea of Nezu employing a kid any. Sure he understood that the principal likely had his reasons, which Toshinori and everyone else were totally in the dark about- but what the hell could a kid bring to the school staff that they didn't have already?

_That_ was the multi million dollar question here.

Hearing a knock on his office door, and looked up as Midnight peeked in and said. "Hey, we're going to go to the...place. You coming? Or does Shota need to start making up weird excuses for you?"

He sighed, and thought for a moment before finally saying, "I'll come." But he didn't have to like it any. Was left unsaid between them as the woman nodded her head and told him that she was going to wait outside for him along with the others.

He nodded his head and waited for her to leave before swearing softly to himself as he shut down his computer and then grabbed his jacket and headed towards the door.

Once he was outside of his office, he started walking down the hall to where he could hear Midnight and the others waiting on him.

Hizashi was loud as usual.

The man having seemingly forgotten what an 'inside' voice was in his excitment to meet the newbies. "Yeah! I wonder if any of them are cute girls?" He said loudly as Toshinori finally joined them.

"I think Nezu said something about three of them being girls. But only one of them is single." Midnight said with a thoughtful expression. It made sense that out of them all, she would know that. The woman was always looking for more female's to make friends with since she didn't have many to begin with.

Being a pro-hero was often times very difficult. Especially for women.

The job made it hard to meet people and establish long term connections with them. Not only that, but not everyone in the world was okay with have a pro-hero for a friend. The hours were longer than necessary, the work harder then it should have been, and often times you had to run off in the middle of important stuff just to do you're much more important job.

"Bummer!" Hizashi said as he stuffed his hands in his jacket and started walking. Toshinori sighed as they all fell into step along side one another as they left the school.

The walk to the restaurant wasn't particularly a long one for them. But it _was_ anxiety inducing.

Meeting new people was always anxiety inducing. Especially when they had to pretend_ not_ to be pro-heroes for the time being since they weren't sure what Nezu had told the newbies about them just yet. Much less what they may or may not have heard about them from the press.

Finally they reached the place that Nezu had mentioned to them, and were starting to go inside when they heard a ruckus coming from around the corner of the building.

The sounds of arguing and flesh being stuck, made them all pause for a moment at the door and exchange a wary glance with each other as someone, a young lady around twenty or so appeared from within the restaurant and took a moment to eye the lot of them before moving on.

"Rukia! Are you out here yet?"

There was a bang followed by a thud that sounded suspiciously like a body hitting the ground coming from the alleyway a split second before a young lady walked out of the alley looking _irked_.

The young lady was a tall, eye catching beauty with long blue-black hair that was pulled back into a high ponytail, leaving only her bangs and a few loose strands here or there to flirt with her pretty face. And wide exotically beautiful turquoise eyes rimmed in a fringe of dark lashes.

The young lady that had just peeked out of the restaurant blinked at the sight of the other and then her expression lit up like a Christmas tree and she practically ran poor Hizashi down in her effort to get out the door. "Ichigo!" She shrieked happily as she flung herself into the other young lady's arms.

"Gyaa!" The dark haired beauty yelped as she caught the shorter woman and staggered a little bit under her weight. But she didn't fall over like any of them had expected.

Toshinori watched the small exchange curiously as a slight smile tugged at the corners of his lips.

"Ichigo, Ichigo, Ichigo-" The shorter woman chanted as she hugged her companion tightly and rubbed her face against the taller lady's shirt.

The taller woman looked a little bit embarrassed by her friend rubbing her face against her shirt, and then a little bit mortified by the fact that there was a group of strangers present to see the whole spectacle. Her face turned a pretty pink color and she quickly attempted to pry herself free of her friend.

Which only worked so much since her friend didn't seem to want to let her go and was sort of doing an rather impressive impersonation of a leech. At present she'd somehow managed to migrate her way from the front of her friend's body to the back where she was currently hanging with her arms around the taller woman's neck and her legs wrapped around her waist, looking mighty happy with herself.

'Ichigo', the poor girl- looked torn between laughing, crying and maybe turning around and walking away and trying to pretend that no one was watching. But even Toshi had to admit, no matter what else happened this evening; seeing the two young ladies being utter goof balls was definitely worth coming out for.

Finally the dark haired woman seemed to give up whatever internal fight she had been struggling with, and heaved a sigh as she absently reached up and patted her 'leech' friend's head and then started walking forward.

"Aww, you two are so cute!" Midnight gushed at them as the two started to brush by them. Ichigo paused for a moment to give them an awkward tight lipped smile as her friend's head popped up and she chirped.

"Thanks! Ichigo- she thinks we're cute!"

Ichigo made a humming sound, but otherwise didn't speak or comment on anything for a moment before slowly asking, "Are you guys the UA teachers?" Her friend went totally silent as soon as she opened her mouth to speak, so her chattering didn't interrupt.

"We are." Hisashi said as soon as he was back up on his feet again.

"Alright," Ichigo said as she patted one of her friend's thighs twice, and they noted that the smaller woman abruptly released her and stood back up on her own feet as Shota asked,

"Are you two...t-the-"

"Newbies?" Ichigo supplied helpfully. Everyone nodded their heads soberly and the young lady smiled at them all, amused. "Yeah. That would be us," She said as she turned her head to her companion and said, "Orihime, say hello to our co-workers."

"Hello, co-workers!"

Everyone stared at the two young ladies for several heartbeats before finally recovering from their shock just enough to actually greet the two and introduce themselves.

Orihime was a chatter box, was the first thing that Toshinori took note of. The second thing was that she was in her twenties and was wearing a wedding band. And the third thing that he noted about her, was that she had a very sweet and loving personality. Which would or wouldn't be a poor fit for their school, depending on what exactly her job was.

Whereas the dark haired young lady, Ichigo didn't really speak much at all unless she was directly asked something.

And he was also shocked to find out that_ she_ was also the kid that Nezu decided to hire. Though her personality was hardly all that child like to the casual observer. Ichigo, despite her age had a sort of old soul quality that made her seem wise beyond her years.

Not only that, but she had a nice smile too.

The moment that Toshi saw it, he felt an odd fluttering sensation in his chest. Like a little hummingbird was loose in his chest or something. It was weird.

"Are the two of you the only one's here so far?" Shota finally managed to ask.

"We're actually the only one's coming. One of our other friends was in an accident earlier and his wife, who is you're other co-worker- had to take him to the hospital where her," Ichigo pointed to Orihime before continuing on. "Husband is going to fix him up. Uryu would have been here with Orihime and I, to meet you all if Renji hadn't have been in a wreck."

"O-Oh. That's terrible." Hizashi said sadly. Genuinely seeming to be bummed by the fact that one of their friends was hurt and in the hospital.

"He'll be fine." Ichigo said as Orihime nodded her head enthusiastically before chiming in.

"It's true. He will be. I very much doubt that a mere wreck would take him out when he's managed to survive Ichigo."

Ichigo looked at the shorter woman oddly and muttered, "You make it sound like I genuinely tried to kill him."

"Didn't you?" Orihime shot back.

Ichigo scrunched her nose up a little bit before finally shrugging and saying, "The court's couldn't prove anything." Earning a snort of amusement from her friend before she then suggesting, "Anyways...let's go ahead and go inside. I don't know about the rest of you but I'm kind of hungry."

There was a hushed murmur of agreement from the group and they all decided to go inside instead of remain outside loitering. Following the girl inside.

The inside of restaurant was far nicer than the outside of it was. The set up was nice and cozy. Which was perfect for families with young children, or even couples whom had just starting dating. But there were even some sections towards the back of the building that were also set up like VIP lounges.

For the sake of privacy for anyone who came here to do personal business or even do work. The back sections were set up specifically to allow for as much privacy as possible with little to no disturbance.

Which was great considering that the lot of them were working for UA and couldn't speak freely about a lot of stuff while out in public. Not to mention their lives as pro-heroes.

So it wasn't really all that surprising to them that they all wound up in one of the back rooms, sitting at a large table, looking over the restaurant menu in under ten minutes flat.

Toshinori was sitting on Ichigo's right, where he found himself studying her far more than the menu at the moment. But in all honesty, he couldn't help it. She was...kind of an enigma to him.

A puzzle in desperate need of solving.

And really, he _liked_ the challenge that she represented to him.

But even more than that, was the fact that something about her just seemed to draw him to her. He didn't know what it was exactly, in fact he had a little bit of a difficult time simply pin pointing it- but something was definitely drawing him to her.

Letting his intense blue eyes flicker up from the menu again, he stared hard at her profile as he tried to figure out exactly what it was that was...tugging at his mind so insistently.

"Is something wrong?" She asked in a low tone without even looking up from her menu. Next to her Orihime lifted her head a little bit and looked around the table before seeming to realize that her friend wasn't talking to her. Of course by this time, the girl had lowered her menu and laid it flat on the table and was looking at him.

Toshi stammered out something pitiful sounding, like not understanding something on the menu- despite the fact that he could read the kanji quite well. Ichigo leaned over towards him a tad, and he lowered his menu so that she could see what was giving him 'trouble' and then took several moments to read the words and tell him what it described.

He smiled like an idiot the whole time, feeling embarrassed at being caught looking at her so easily. For fuck's sake, he was a pro-hero! She shouldn't have even _noticed_ that he'd been looking! He had been studying her covertly from over the top of his menu.

There's very few people who would have been able to even notice what he was doing. Regardless of how close they sat or not. A person had to know what to look for- oh. _Oh! _

He blinked at her as she sat back in her seat and shot him a slight smile before picking her menu up again and burying her face in it as his jaw nearly dropped open in disbelief.

_Holy shit_. She'd known all along that he was looking at her!

Catching a small sliver of turquoise from over the top of the menu, he nearly started to sputter as his face reddened. Oh god...shed been studying him while he'd been studying her. The only difference between them was subtlety in which the action was executed.

Toshinori wasn't well known for being subtle about much. But he knew how to study a person and gather information on them easily enough. And while he'd been careful...obviously he hadn't been careful enough not to get caught. Whereas Ichigo had managed to do the same with him, but much, much easier. And with far less risk of being caught.

This meant that she was probably much better at observing and gathering information on others than he was. Which was freakishly scary depending on what exactly she was looking for.

He just barely managed to hold back his nervous gulp when Shota finally decided to ask the girl why she'd been hired to work at their school. Automatically snapping his attention to her, he held his breath and waited patiently for her to respond.

"Oh, I'm an extra security guard and self defense teacher for the school."

"Huh?!" Everyone said in unison as they all stared at her.

"Ah, sorry. Maybe that wasn't a very clear explanation," The girl said awkwardly as she set her menu down again and folded her hands on top of it as she said, "Nezu basically hired me to do jobs that a lot of you often times are simply spread too thin to do."

"He made a point of telling me that between teaching a bunch of rambunctious kids all day, and fighting crime and such- a lot of you miss out on vacation time and days off that you really, really need. In fact he pointed out that a bunch of you need to be able to take time off from time to time to relax and unwind. Your health is basically at risk when you don't."

"So he hired me to make sure that some new safety and security protocols were put into effect since the attack a month ago. He also got his hands on my records and noted that I know quite a bit about fighting and such and thought that it would be a good idea for me to teach classes on how to fight _without_ the use of a quirk. Just in case the kids have to go undercover or have their abilities disabled. As much as it's good for them to know how to use them- if they rely too heavily on them, then they'll get themselves into trouble later on, that they can't get themselves out of."

"Oh..." Everyone said in unison, again. You know, the more they heard her talk about what their student's needed to know, the more they realized that they focused more on the children's quirks, and how to train them to use them, than they did on how they _needed_ to fight without them.

"Yikes!" Hizashi suddenly shouted out. "We're bad teachers!" And then banged his head on the table. _Loudly_.

"You _aren't_ bad teachers," Ichigo said in an attempt to alleviate everyone's concerns. "It's probably just something that you never really thought that the kids would need. That doesn't make you bad teachers. Just...human."

"You're a sweet kid." Nemuri sniffled causing Ichigo to stiffen up slightly in her seat and look at the woman with a slightly alarmed expression. Next to her Orihime tried to smother a laugh behind her hand, as the girl seemed to spaz out.

"I'm not nice," She hissed at Nemuri. "Orihime- she called me _nice_!"

"How dare she." Orihime laughed, her tone amused as she dropped her hand away from her mouth.

"I know. She doesn't know what I'm like at all!"

"Nope, sure doesn't." Orihime agreed with a roll of her eyes. "If she did, she'd know that you go out of your way to walk elderly little old ladies across the street, play chess in the park with some of the retired Veterans who have no family, and do stuff for the local shelters. Like donate clothing, toys, food and even medical supplies."

"I don't know, all of that sounds nice." Toshinori decided to chime in, a bemused expression on his face as he shot the girl a smile. She turned that pretty pink color from earlier and quickly hid her face against Orihime's shoulder causing the woman to flat out erupt into peals of near hysterical laughter as she reached up and absently patted the girl's dark head.

"Aww, you poor thing. Are our new co-workers picking on you already?" She crooned playfully. The girl lifted her head a little bit but didn't completely remove her face from Orihime's shoulder.

The rest of the evening consisted of dinner, some questions- for instance, Hizashi had asked what Ichigo and Orihime's quirks were, only to find out that the two were Meta-humans- jokes, and a couple of alcoholic beverages for everyone. Except Orihime. Whom upon having some drinks bought for her, promptly handed them off to Ichigo who would sigh and then toss them back.

Toshinori had noted that the girl had managed to get her hands on at least three of the more potent drinks before he decided to intervein on her behalf. Mostly out of annoyance since it wasn't right for a seventeen year old girl to drink.

He tended to hold his alcohol, better than most of his friends who were already well on their way to being totally sloshed anyways.

So when Orihime handed Ichigo her fourth drink, and the girl gave a slight grimace and prepared to toss it back like the others- until he reached out and gently placed his hand over the top of the glass to stop her. Earning a wide eyed look from the girl as he deftly took it from her small hand and drank it himself while keeping his eyes locked on her face.

"You shouldn't be drinking at your age." He said gently, but firmly as he set the glass aside.

If Ichigo was going to say anything about him telling her what she should and shouldn't do at her age, she didn't show it. Hell she didn't even looked bothered like most kids in her place, would be.

"I wouldn't usually," She said after a moment or so of hesitation before going on to say, "But you're friends keep buying Orihime drinks and she_ can't_ have them."

Tilting his head a little bit, he regarded the dark haired girl curiously as he turned her words over in his mind for a moment before catching on to what she'd just hinted at. His expression lighting up somewhat with understanding as his previous annoyance melted away and he smiled at her.

"I see." Was all that he could think to say for the moment._ She's a good friend_. Toshi thought to himself as he propped his chin in his hand and observed her for a tad bit longer. The time to leave was quickly approaching and he had no desire to linger for longer than he should. Though he would stick around just long enough to see his friends all in a cab and on their way home, before he walked to his own.

Weirdly enough, Orihime was the first to decide to leave. She'd been stifling yawns for the past thirty minutes or so, when she finally got up and excused herself to head home. Ichigo made her promise to call her once she was home to let her know that she was okay, and the woman smiled and waved at them all before quietly leaving.

Once she was gone, the girl sat back in her seat with a tired sigh while Toshi kept staring at her thoughtfully. After she was done with whatever it was that she'd been thinking about for the moment, she then got up and grabbed the bill for everyone's food and drink causing him to sit up straighter in his seat and look vaguely nervous.

"Here." He said as he held his hand out to take the check from her. Just because Nezu set this little meeting up between them all didn't mean that the poor girl should get stuck paying for everyone's semi-_drunk_ asses. It would be rude of him not to at least offer to take care of paying the bill instead. I mean, he _was_ a gentleman, right?

"I'll take care of the-" He started to say that he'd pay the bill. But stopped when she pulled out her wallet and dug out several crisp bills and set a few of them down on the table as a generous tip, and the waved the waiter that had taken their orders earlier, over and handed him the money for the bill.

"I've got it." Was all that she said as the guy took her money and scampered off as Toshinori slumped down in his seat a little bit.

"I feel bad that you got paid for us all."

"Don't be. I'm fairly used to paying for others," Ichigo said as she gave everyone a once over before huffing slightly, "We...should do something with these guys before they all wind up passed out."

"Yeah." He sighed as he slowly got up and dug out his cell phone. He'd call the others their cab and then see if the girl needed someone to walk her home since it was likely dark out now, and pretty late in the evening.

Plus he'd feel even worse than he currently did if he let her walk home alone in the dark, and something happened to her.

After placing the call to the cab company, he slipped his phone back into his pocket and looked over to see a very drunk Hizashi had backed the girl up against the wall and was hitting on her.

"Hizashi! _Stop that now_!" Toshinori said sharply, causing the man to jump a little and skitter away from her, since it was rare of him to raise the volume of his voice while he was in his weaker form.

"But she's cuuuuute!" His friend argued as he reached out to touch the girl's face. Toshi had a split second to see a weird look of apprehension flicker across the girl's face before he snapped angrily.

"I don't care how cute she is. She's seventeen and young enough to be you're daughter. Now keep your damned hands off of her!"

"Aww, killjoy." Hizashi muttered in a depressed tone as he staggered over to Shota and then flopped down across the man's lap and whined. "Shoootaaa! Pay attention to me..." As Toshinori moved over to Ichigo and stopped just an inch or so away from her and looked her over to see if she was really okay.

She seemed alright. But that didn't always mean anything.

"Are you alright?"

"Hn?" Ichigo said unintelligibly before blinking and tipping her head back to look at him and stammered out. "I-I'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Hn? Uh..yeah. I-I didn't expect anyone to get so drunk that they'd get handsy with me, that's all."

He made a noncommittal sound, and filed her reaction to the idea of someone getting handsy with her- away in the back of his mind to ask her about later, and simply nodded his head and then moved to get Hizashi off of Shota before the man decided to start throwing punches.

Hizashi whined as he was pulled off of his friend and deposited in the seat next to Nemuri since the woman was already asleep and a very uninteresting person to talk too at the moment.

Finally he was told that the cab was out front, but one of the restaurant employees. And not a moment too soon either.

Hizashi had gotten too bored with trying to talk to a sleeping woman, and get Shota to pay attention to him and was now in the process of singing and stripping out of his clothing and trying to be sexy.

Poor Ichigo had let out a weird sound the second that he dropped his shirt and jacket on the floor and turned that same pretty shade of pink and quickly averted her eyes. While Toshinori simply _glared_ at the man in irritation and wondered if he should render him unconscious to prevent him for doing anything else foolish.

But since the cab was waiting for his friends, he figured that it was best to start loading them up. He managed to get Shota and Nemuri easily enough. The tow of them didn't bother whining or arguing or anything. In fact they sort of made him feel like a father trying to wrangle all of his kids and put them to bed.

It was a weird feeling.

And once he finished putting them in the cab and letting the two curl up together and go back to sleep while he went back for Hizashi. Luckily, he caught him before he could drop his pants- and promptly slung him up onto his shoulder and walked back out of the room. Leaving Ichigo standing there with her face hidden until he returned again.

"Okay, they're gone." He said with a sigh of relief as he re entered the room to get her.

"Are you sure?"

"I just tossed Hizashi in the cab and watched it drive away myself, so yes. I'm sure."

"Okay." She said as she slowly dropped her hands away from her face a little bit so that she could check for herself. The action was oddly endearing. And elicited a small chuckle from him as he grabbed his jacket from the back of his seat and walked back to her.

"Come," He said gently. She looked at him oddly for a moment, and then opened her mouth to argue with him. But he nipped that in the bud quickly enough by reaching out and draped an arm around her slender shoulders, and putting his hand over her mouth before saying firmly, "I'm walking you home. And there will be _no_ arguments otherwise. Understand?"

She blinked at him, her eyes wide and startled looking as she slowly nodded her head. Apparently deciding that it was best to let him do whatever he wanted instead of bicker with him.

Smart girl. Bickering with him would have gotten her nowhere anyways.

* * *

The walk to Ichigo's home was a fairly quiet one since the two of them rarely bothered to engage in conversation. Which was a mistake that Toshi supposed needed to be rectified since they were going to work together.

"When do you start work at the school?" He finally asked, his curiosity getting the better of him.

"Tomorrow morning at eight."

He hummed, "Will you have any difficulty getting to work on time due to the alcohol that you consumed?"

"No."

"Good." He found himself saying as he eyed the small group of hoodlums hanging out on the street corner, watching them with a calculating gleam in their eyes.

Toshi moved closer to Ichigo so that he could better protect her should the hoodlums decided to try anything untoward. If she noticed how close he suddenly was, she didn't say anything. Nor did she say anything when he slipped his arm back around her shoulders in a possessive manner that was meant to warn people off.

After all, just because he wasn't in his muscle form didn't mean that he couldn't do any _damage_ to someone.

"Tell me something about yourself." He said all of a sudden, hoping that he could distract her since he could hear the hoodlums moving along behind them now. The fools probably thought that just because they were a couple of people out late, that they would make easy pickings for a mugging or something. Toshinori would make sure that it wasn't a mistake that they ever made again.

"Like what?"

"Well..." He thought for a moment before suddenly blurting out. "Do you have a boyfriend?" He wasn't sure what exactly possessed him to ask her such a thing. It wasn't any of his business if she had a boyfriend or not. And yet...he was oddly curious about what kind of person she liked as a potential significant other.

"No. I don't date." She said curtly, her tone bleeding with frustration.

"Oh?" He asked, noting the odd tone to her voice and wondered what had caused her to sound like that. Was it his question? "Why not? You're seventeen, beautiful, single- most young men would count their lucky stars for hitting such a jackpot."

"Most boys my age are also immature idiots with only _one_ thing on their minds." She said in a dark tone.

"Please tell me that you didn't like someone like that," He said in a pleading tone. She shot him a look and his breath left him in a hiss as rage boiled in his blood. _Oh hell no. _Pulling her to a stop for a moment, he forced her to turn to face him and demanded, "What happened?"

She shrugged her shoulders a little and sighed. "I liked a guy. We got 'together' and he conned me into sleeping with him. He said that if I cared about him, then I would. And I was pretty stupid to think that it meant anything. He was a little bit of a player and I thought that maybe I could change him. We were together for almost a month when I had a pregnancy scare. He dumped me without telling me. And then went around town handing my phone number out to some really sleazy people and told them to come see me for a 'real good time'."

Toshinori's jaw dropped open in shock and horror as he stared down at her.

Part of him debating about asking for names so that he could hunt down the bastards that she'd mentioned. While another part of him wondered idly if he could call in a few favors and make the whole damn lot of them to _disappear_.

_Choices, choices_... He thought to himself as he finally closed his mouth before growling, "He was an asshole."

"No kidding." She said in wry amusement.

"How long ago was it?"

"About two years."

"T-Two y-years?!" He stammered out after almost swallowing his tongue. "And you haven't dated anyone since?"

She shrugged again. "It's difficult to find the right person that can put up with my..._eccentricities_. Plus I sort of a have a few sex kinks that make people a little bit awkward around me."

"Oh? Do tell." He said in interest as they started walking again.

"Well, I sort of like doms. Or people similar in nature to them. I can't exactly say that the idea of coming home from work to have someone push me up against the nearest wall or table and ravishing me isn't exciting. Bondage is fun, as long as it's done right," Toshi listened to her carefully. "There's some other stuff too. But I don't really feel all that comfortable mentioning any of it right now."

"Because we just met."

"Yeah, plus it also sort of feels like it's girl talk stuff. So...awkward much."

"Ah. That's understandable then. Where is you're home?" He asked all of a sudden. She pointed to an two story brick building across the street from their current location. "Ah, I guess that this is where we part ways then." He said as he rubbed the back of his neck with one of his hands.

"Yeah. Thanks for walking me home, Toshinori."

"No problem young Ichigo." He said with a friendly little finger wave before she walked away from him. He stood there for several moments, just to be sure that she actually went inside before finally turning to leave.

But decided not to leave the immediate area before he had a few words with some hoodlums first.

* * *

Ichigo watched him from inside the door of the building, well out of sight. Her body partially hidden by the shadows, her cell had been vibrating for a few minutes now.

The usual sign that Hollows were active in the area.

Sighing at yet_ another_ night of sleep being lost to her, she waited until she was absolutely certain that Toshinori was gone. Before she stepped back out onto the street and dug her cell out of her pocket, and fired a quick text to Orihime and the others before she went running off into the night.

Duty called. And who was she to ignore it?

Hopefully the school would have a lot of fucking coffee because once she got back and got patched up/cleaned up- she'd probably be too wound up to really sleep anyways. So coffee, was probably going to be a must if she was going to stay active enough to do her job.


	2. Chapter 2

Toshinori slept his usual few hours upon returning home, and then got up at five a.m. to go about his usual daily morning routine. Which now consisted of getting up, dressing to go jogging- eating some toast with strawberry jam on it, and after his morning run- he came back home, showered and then while he still had some time to himself- he decided to look up anything that he could on Ichigo Kurosaki.

Now don't get him wrong, their meeting the night before had been pleasant enough.

And she seemed like a very, very nice girl. However there was also something just..._off_ about her. He just couldn't quite explain what it was and was hoping that a look at anything that he could pull up on UA's school records and servers might help to explain the strange nagging sensation that he got at the back of his mind when he thought about her.

However upon pulling up her files and such, he found that there wasn't terribly much about her that he could find. There was several _encrypted_ files about her that required a password and special permission from Nezu himself. Which was strange if not a little bit perplexing to him. And he knew that trying to look at them any further would activate Nezu's online security programs that he had rigged to protect the girl's information from being hacked.

Still...seeing that there was something there...something that even Principal Nezu felt that no one should have access too, it made him even _more_ deeply curious about her than before.

Sitting back on his couch, he stared down at the laptop computer perched on his lap and steepled his fingers together and touched one of his knuckles to his mouth as she scanned what he could access on the girl.

Everything from name, date of birth, to blood type was there. And while it was nice to know some of those small things, it still didn't help him with that nagging sensation in the back of his mind.

Huffing slightly, he shut his computer down and then set it aside so that he could go and slip his shoes on and head out to work. Maybe he'd take the long way there and see if he could catch the girl on her way to U.A. while he was at it.

Feeling his lips curve upwards a little bit in a small smile, he grabbed his jacket, wallet and keys before quickly heading out the door. Once he was outside, he took a moment or so to weigh the pro's and con's of using his muscle form to search young Ichigo out.

As a fellow co-worker to himself and other heroes it was alright for him to disclose his secret about his All Might form and his weaker one to her. Especially since she was the security officer and would likely need to work out specific security protocols for when he fought and went past his time limit and such.

Besides, if she didn't find out from him, she might find out from Orihime or the other doctor that would be joining the school's employ.

And while he didn't know the other doctor, he already had a decent feel for Orihime's personality. And he already knew that the woman wouldn't be able to keep his secret any. She was far too talkative.

Not that there was anything wrong with that per sey. It was just a bad characteristic to have when one wanted to keep a secret. That was all.

So once he finished locking up his home, he took a moment to let himself change forms and then took off running as fast as he could. If he went at a semi leisurely speed then he would reach Ichigo's neighborhood in less than five minutes. And might be able to even catch her as she was walking out the door.

* * *

Ichigo was dead tired. Literally.

Between meeting her new co-workers the previous evening, running around fighting Hollows all night, not being able to get any damned sleep for the past few days since moving to the city. And tripping down some stairs a little while ago because of a dizzy spell caused by her tiredness and a little bit of a concussion that one of the Hollows had given her several hours prior- she was _beyond_ exhausted.

She was lucky to have not already decided to collapse somewhere and simply take a month long nap.

Thank god she was going to be working in the same place as Uryu, Orihime, and Rukia or else she'd be well on her way to being dead. And not the funny kind either.

Shuffling down the steps of the building where she had taken up residence and quietly made her way to the door, she barely managed to slip her shoes on without falling on her face, and then grabbed her keys and stepped outside.

It was nice out today. Much like it had been for the past few days.

And the second that the sunlight hit her eyes... Ichigo hissed like a vampire and had to resist the urge to absolutely fucking _hate_ the sun.

"Shit. I need sun glasses." She muttered to herself as she stifled a wide yawn behind one of her hands and took a moment to lean against the door to her home so that she could get her bearings. If she didn't, she'd likely face plant in the middle of the street and stay there even if it meant possibly getting run over a few times.

With as tired as she was at the moment, she was totally fine with laying down and becoming street pizza.

Orihime and Rukia would likely be utterly pissed at her for allowing a vehicle or two to run her over. But she was still fine with it just the same.

Finally managing to muster up the strength to move, she slowly pushed away for the building and started walking in the direction of the school. Rukia was supposed to meet her somewhere down the street with food and coffee since she was too fucking tired to even bother to fend for herself.

And after that she was supposed to go straight to the school and begin her work. Orihime already planned to swing by the school around lunch time and feed her again. And maybe look her over from more injuries, just in case she'd accidentally missed something earlier due to her own tiredness.

Ichigo wasn't mad about that though. Orihime was extra tired because of her pregnancy and needed the extra rest. Rukia had been the same way when she'd first gotten pregnant. And now that she was several months along, she was perfectly fine.

So she only had to bear with it for a few more moths barring any complications that may occur.

She was half way down the street when she was hit by another dizzy spell and wound up staggering a little bit and might have actually fallen if not for the fact that someone appeared out of a whirl wind and large hands gently caught her by the shoulders and steadied her.

Startled by the fact that someone was touching her, Ichigo jerked a little bit and snapped her head up to look at the person and came face to face with Japan's number one hero himself.

"W-Wha?"

"Careful, miss. You look as if you're moments away from collapsing." He said, his tone softer than it usually was. Which was unusual for him, and made her frown a little bit.

Before taking the job at U.A. Ichigo and the others had sat down to study up on some of their co-workers. Not in a creepy way or anything. But to figure out some of their personality traits and habits so that they could better interact with them without stepping on anyone's toes.

There was a lot of news coverage on all of them as well as amateur shot videos and shit of some of their fights and heroics on the internet.

And since the guy currently keeping her on her feet was the number one hero- they had taken several days to look up what they could on him.

His name wasn't known to the public, which was understandable since it gave him enough anonymity to protect himself outside of his work. But one of the first things that Ichigo had noticed about him- aside from his size, that is- was the fact that his hero persona was based off of _Superman_.

Like literally.

He was huge, bigger than life.

However the way that he presented himself to the world was abnormally bold, which spoke of underlying self esteem issues. His self confidence was also abnormal. Which meant that he probably hid his doubts, fears, and concern underneath his smile.

Ichigo had been there before. She tended to smile when she was hurt the most.

If nothing else she felt that it gave her strength and courage to keep going and push her pain aside. All Might was probably the same way. And she wasn't sure why, but that kind of bothered her.

"Are you alright now miss? Or do you need to sit down?" He asked after several moments of silence. His blue eyes curiously locked on her face as a small frown tugged at the corner of his lips as he studied her.

"I-I'm fine." Her speech was slurred a little bit and he could plainly see some dark bruise-like circles underneath her eyes that he could almost swear weren't there the previous evening.

Making a non committal sound, he reluctantly released her shoulders and debated on whether or not he should pick her up and carry her to the nearest hospital or clinic. She really didn't look very good at all to him. However once his hands were away from her, she slowly shook her head and started to move around him.

Muttering a soft thanks to him as she did so.

Still...she didn't look well, and despite his earlier plans he felt that perhaps he should stay close to her and keep an close eye on her.


	3. Chapter 3

If Ichigo was bothered by Toshinori's seven foot something, muscular figure trailing along after her like a lost puppy, she never let on. Much less said anything about it. But then, he wondered what exactly she was supposed to say about having his All Might form following her around anyways.

He supposed that she could have asked him what the hell he was doing. But since she didn't, he figured that she already knew.

The whole time he'd been following her since earlier, he'd seen her falter and stagger a little bit here and there. And to be perfectly honest, his protective instinct was starting to really ride him _hard_ here.

"Miss?"

"Hn?"

"Would you like some help getting to the nearest doctor or clinic?" He found himself asking. Hoping against hope that she might let him do something to help her since he was getting fed up with watching her damn near collapse every few minutes or so.

"No thanks," She said. "I have to go to work."

"But- You aren't in any condition to!" He found himself arguing, inwardly cringing a little bit at how childish his tone must have sounded to her.

She absently waved a hand at him but kept walking. _The stubborn little mule._ He thought in annoyance as she started to stagger again a little bit. He let out an uncharacteristic growling sound and promptly reached out and scooped her up in his arms.

"Hey!" She yelped as she found herself settled in the crook of one insanely huge arm and squirmed in an effort to get him to put her down.

_"Stop. Moving."_ He snapped at her in a warning tone that practically screamed of temper as he used his free hand to firmly push her torso against his chest and continued walking as if he hadn't just picked her up and was now forcing her to let him carry her around like a fucking doll.

She huffed and against her better judgement, rested her head on his shoulder as she muttered sullenly. "You're a lot nicer in the videos that I've seen." Which he supposed was her way of telling him that he wasn't very nice at all in person.

Which was just a tad bit offensive considering that he was trying to _help_ her.

"I am nice," Was all that he could think to say to her. She snorted and stifled a yawn as he suddenly asked, "Did you not get any sleep at all last night?"

"Hn? No. After one of my new co-workers walked me home, I was attacked." She said in a drowsy tone. Totally missing the way that he nearly tripped over his own feet upon hearing her words before he went totally and utterly still.

"Attacked? By who?" He asked, his voice taking on a dangerously low rumbling growling quality.

"Doesn't matter..." She said tiredly. "I took care of em. Not before they knocked me through a wall and gave me a concussion though... And I fell down some stairs earlier too." He sucked in a breath and turned his head a little bit to look at her. Noting that she looked barely a second away from falling asleep on him.

"Are you hurt?" He asked curiously wondering if maybe the concussion from the attack coupled with her trip down the stairs that she'd just mentioned had somehow made her worse off.

He kept expecting her to say something. In fact he was pretty much waiting on her to reply in some manner. However a small puff of warm breath against the side of his throat indicated that if he continued to wait then he'd be doing so for a while.

The blasted girl had fallen asleep on him.

Huffing softly, he brought a large hand up to carefully cover her head and then took off running again. Deciding that it might be in her best interests if he went ahead and took her somewhere where she could get looked at. And since she was so dead set on U.A, then he'd simply take her there and let Recovery Girl take a look at her while he went to inform Nezu of her present condition that way she wouldn't get into any trouble for not showing up.

* * *

Toshinori found himself in a peculiar position once Recovery Girl was finished checking over and healing Ichigo. Since the girl was found to be so exhausted, Recovery Girl had put him in charge of _watching_ over her for the day.

Or at least until she woke up, anyways.

Which was a little bit problematic, considering that he had at least two classes to teach at two very different times today. But whatever. He'd figure out what to do about that when the time came.

For the moment, he was just sitting in his office working on his computer while the girl slept curled up on her side on his couch, underneath his jacket. And from time to time, despite not consciously meaning too, his blue eyes strayed from the computer screen to Ichigo.

And then he would frown because he had no damned idea _why_ his eyes kept straying away from his work and over to the girl. Sure she was pretty cute when she was asleep and all but- he just didn't understand. What exactly was so frigging fascinating about her while she slept anyways?

He forced his eyes away from her and back to his work. And sat there trying to type something out for about an hour before finally sighing in annoyance and jumping to his feet and pacing around restlessly. He didn't get it. What was the draw here?

It had to be _something_, but for the life of him he couldn't seem to figure it out.

Turning on his heel, he walked over to the couch and peered down at the sleeping girl through slightly narrowed eyes for a moment. Before then reaching out and very gently placed two of his fingers underneath her chin and tilted her head back on her neck some. And nearly jumped out of his damned skin when he felt her breath ghost across his palm and the inside of his wrist.

Okay, he took back his earlier thought. Ichigo was more than just pretty.

Just like he'd thought the previous evening, she was a shockingly lovely young lady. And he wasn't quite sure why he was acting the way that he was, but he could already hazard a slight guess that his behavior either had something to do with his concern for her after their conversation earlier. Or it stemmed from something else entirely.

Hormones….maybe?

He'd be lying if he didn't say that he'd had a few interesting dreams about her last night once he'd gone to bed. They'd certainly been interesting enough for him to attempt to _try_ and forget about them, and any discomfort and anxiety that they had elicited.

He blamed the combination of alcohol and their little 'relationship' talk. Maybe even some of her mentioned sexual preferences too.

Lord knew that hearing her talk about what she _liked_ in a sexual partner had made him a tad bit hot under the collar. Which was also a tad bit unusual for him. Especially since he didn't normally react to things that he was normally desensitized too because of some of his...more troublesome _female_ co-workers.

Still...it troubled him somewhat that he was acting oddly because of her. Even more concerning was whether or not it was intentional on her part.

Absently brushing his thumb across her slightly parted lips, he stared at her for another moment and then abruptly released her with a curse and went back to his pacing. All while wondering when he'd become such a dirty minded bastard.

If he could manage to keep himself busy either until she woke up or he had to go and teach, then he could abandon her and not return to his office again for the rest of the day.

It sounded easy in theory.

But the time couldn't pass quickly enough to suit him.


	4. Chapter 4

By the time noon rolled around, Toshinori was thoroughly convinced that young Ichigo must be a _villainess_. A diabolical one too. Or at the very least a witch of some sort who'd cast a spell on him when he hadn't been looking. He still hadn't managed to get much work done because he kept letting his eyes stray to her sleeping form.

Granted that wasn't _totally_ her fault.

After all, she hadn't asked to be attacked after he'd walked her home- which was in _part_ the reason why she was currently lying on his couch. But he was going to damned well blame her until she finally woke up and left. Or at least that was his plan anyways.

However at ten minutes after noon, some sort of alarm sounded on her cell phone. Causing the girl to bolt upright where she'd slept, suddenly wide awake and very much aware that she wasn't exactly where she was supposed to be.

He blinked at her, as she took a moment to look around his office before then digging her cell out of her pant's pocket and turned the alarm off before heaving a tired sigh and then looked at him again.

"Toshinori?"

"Ah, yes."

"How did I get here?"

"Oh! All Might brought you by after he took you to see Recovery Girl. Apparently you collapsed on him this morning and wouldn't wake up. So he got worried." He explained smoothly as she slowly removed his jacket from her and put her feet on the floor.

"I see." She said after a moment or so of contemplative silence. "I'll have to thank him, and apologize for worrying him later then."

Toshinori hummed softly, all earlier thoughts of her being a villainess or a witch quickly melting away. Right along with his irritation at not being able to get anything done.

"I'm sorry that you got stuck keeping an eye on me, Toshinori." She said in an apologetic tone as she stood up. "I should go and...do something productive with the rest of my day."

"You don't have to rush off-" He started to say but she merely shook her head at him and moved to give him his jacket back.

"I really need to put in some work since it's my first day. Plus I also need to check in with Rukia and Orihime. One of them was supposed to give me some food this morning, and I never made it. She's probably been freaking out and looking for me. In fact, she'll probably smack me really hard when she next sees me."

"O-Oh. I'm sorry." Toshinori said suddenly looking as if someone had just kicked his puppy. Ichigo cocked her head a little bit as she studied him, noting that for an older guy- he sort of looked pretty cute.

"S'okay. It's not your fault." She said as she set his jacket down on his desk and blinked as the 'kicked puppy' look only seemed to intensify. _Shit. I need to get out of here before he cries or something. _Ichigo thought as she awkwardly excused herself.

Toshinori watched her leave with a thoughtful look on his face and as his office door clicked shut he thought, _It's definitely got to be hormones._ Nothing else in the world could make him act like such a freak.

Unless he was actually right about her being a witch of some sort.

Growling in annoyance, he looked away from his office door just in time to note the time on the clock hanging on his wall and let out a string of curses as he grabbed his jacket and shrugged it on- trying to ignore the fact that it sort of smelled like young Ichigo- and then grabbed his papers and other things and rushed to get to his first class for the day.

* * *

Sure enough, Rukia was with Orihime when she showed up to check on her. And the moment that the petite, violet eyes woman saw her- alive and well and _not_ dead in a ditch somewhere- she hit her. Hard.

"Ow! You violent midget! What the shit?" Ichigo growled out as she rubbed where Rukia had hit her. Christ her boney little knuckles were hard! Ichigo thought as the petite beauty practically started to beat her with her purse as she yelled at her.

"You idiot! How dare you scare the hell out of me like that! I thought that you were dead in a ditch somewhere!"

"I know."

"I looked everywhere that I could think of! I even went and dragged Orihime along when I went to the police station!"

"O-Okay."

"And here you are, _safe_-"

"You're beating the crap out of me, in broad fucking daylight! How _safe_ could I really be- _ow!_" Ichigo yelped as Rukia's purse connected with her shoulder blade. Orihime let out a small hysterical sounding laugh at the funny spectacle that they made as Rukia finally got tired of hitting her with her purse and stood there panting. Ichigo rubbed at her shoulder as she glowered at the smaller woman for a moment before growling, "Jesus, Rukia. Do you carry frigging bricks in that thing or what?"

Orihime quickly slapped a hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter further as Ichigo looked back and forth between her and Rukia in disbelief, because surly Rukia wasn't crazy enough to actually hit her with bricks in her fucking purse, as the smaller woman opened the purse up and dumped out a couple of actual honest god _bricks_.

"Oh you bitch." Ichigo hissed out in a mock angry tone as Rukia simply sighed looked at her for a moment before saying.

"Sorry, but you sort of had that crap coming for worrying me and Orihime."

"Yeah, yeah." Ichigo grumbled. "My daily beating aside, did you guys need anything?"

"Well, Orihime and I were going to check out our offices and see if there is anything that they're missing." Rukia said. Orihime nodded her head enthusiastically.

"We even thought about making lists for things that our work space may need. Tools, first aid kids, pain meds-"

"That's...actually a good idea." Ichigo said as she finally dropped her arm. "Do you two have note pads and pens?" Both women pulled little note pads out and a couple of pens too and held them up for their friend to see. "Alright, when you're done making your lists- bring them to me and I'll see if I can find as many things listed as possible."

"You don't have to do that-" Orihime started to say as the younger girl waved off her words.

"I know. But the two of you are _expecting_. And there's simply some stuff that you're limited to not doing. If there's anything on the lists that I can find for you, then humor me, and let me."

"Alright." Orihime said with a sigh. Rukia grumbled something about 'stubborn jerks' that had Ichigo reaching out and promptly pinching one of her cheeks. The dark haired woman yelped, loudly and quickly smacked at her hand to get her to let go of her face.

Ichigo sniggered at the perturbed look on the smaller woman's face before then waving them both off so that they could go and do stuff while she sorted some more of her own shit out.


End file.
